Prepaid meters: DisCos, consumers faceoff over extortion, meter bypass

Electricity consumers in many parts of Nigeria often have frictions with electricity distribution companies otherwise known as (DisCos); with regards to perceived outrageous billing method, especially in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). This is even as these consumers have accused DisCos of extortion on the pretext of providing and installing prepaid metres even as DisCos have accused consumers of bypassing prepaid meters to avoid paying for electricity, PAUL OKAH takes a look at the situation.

If there is anything that irritates consumers in Nigeria it is paying electricity bills given the near absence of electricity supply in most parts of the country. Notwithstanding the epileptic power supply the bills come like clockwork. This is compounded by “crazy” estimated bills from DisCos, which customers are expected to settle at the end of every month or risk disconnection.

Even consumers using prepaid meters are not left out, as arguments often arise from accusations of metre bypass or adjustments. Blueprint Weekend checks, however, revealed that staff of DisCos are complicit in metre bypass and adjustment as they often offer to ‘assist’ usually at an agreed cost to consumers.

There are also allegations of many DisCos officials engaging in the extortion of electricity consumers for the installation of prepaid metres and disappearing with customers’ money without delivering the goods.

Also, many DisCos officials have been reported to have been manhandled in the course of distributing electricity bills or checking installed prepaid metres for infractions. Instances abound where tenants are at loggerhead with other tenants as well as house owners in situations where meters are shared.

In many cases where a landlord lives in the same apartment with tenants, he is usually in charge of collection and payment of electricity bills, however, suspicion of exploitation usually arise, with tenants accusing the landlord of making them pay for his electricity consumption. Blueprint Weekend checks indicate that tenants may not even have access to the electricity bills, but would pay any amount stipulated by the landlord.

Our correspondent reports that the amount charge may be fixed, as the landlord must have arranged with DisCos officials for a particular bill to be brought to him.

However, in instances where prepaid metres are used in such an apartment, an agreed amount is charged by landlord to tenants for the purchase of unit cards. Needless to say the charge is always pushed to the tenants, as he may not know how much purchased until when the next payment is due.

Landlord vs tenants

In a chat with Blueprint Weekend, a tenant in Lugbe a satellite town of the FCT Mr Festus Okorie said he lives in a self-contained apartment where he shares a prepaid metre with the landlord, but was always having a loggerhead with him over electricity bill.

He said: “I thought I was lucky to secure an apartment with prepaid metres because the former compound did not have a prepaid metre. There was always a problem in paying electricity bills and I particularly hate living in a compound with cantankerous people, which was why I packed out at the slightest opportunity.

“However, I discovered that my present landlord is also exploitative. At the end of every month, he would require me to pay him N2,000 for electricity bill, despite the fact that we are supposed to be using a prepaid metre. As it is installed in his room, I have no access to know how much he recharges in a month, but I know I don’t even use up to the amount I pay, as I don’t have properties.”

Tenants vs tenants

Blueprint Weekend checks further indicate that in shared apartments with many tenants, it is usually difficult for electricity bills to be paid on time. Tenants, who either share prepaid metres or are on estimated billing, are always reluctant to pay.

While some of the tenants would have their money ready before the due date, others would require time to gather the money, thereby delaying payment. When DisCos officials come for disconnection, the action of a few tenants would then affect the others, who had the money ready.

In a chat with Blueprint Weekend a civil servant living in Kugbo, a suburb of the FCT, Mrs Rita Adebayo said payment of estimated bills was always a problem in a compound she is staying. According to her, most of the tenants don’t have pressing need for electricity and would rather inflict pain on others than contribute to common good.

“It is always a problem staying in a house without prepaid metres, as many tenants would rather stay in darkness than pay for others to use light. I can’t tell how many times our light was disconnected because of a tenant refusing to pay his or her own bill on time. When we receive a bill of N12,000 meant for eight tenants to share, it is always a problem for the tenants to raise N1,500 within stipulated days,” she said.

Availability of prepaid metres

Despite the directive by Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) that prepaid meters should be made available to interested electricity consumers from May 1, this year investigations by Blueprint Weekend revealed that the meters are mostly unavailable.

This has created opportunity for some DisCos officials to engage in sharp practices and exploit desperate consumers by collecting money on the pretext of fast tracking the process and get meters outside the official channel but at additional cost. However, in most case such official end up swindling these desperate consumers after urging them to wait for months, even years.

Some of the affected clients who spoke to our correspondent the seeming scarcity of prepaid meters may be deliberate as the DisCos want to continually exploit electricity consumers through estimated billing.

Speaking to our correspondent Bayelsa-born civil servant living in Jahi, a settlement in the FCT, Mr Eric John said he paid N25,000 to an AEDC offical for installation of a prepaid meter, since December last year but was yet to receive the meter.

He said efforts to recover his money has proved abortive as the AEDC official was said to have been transferred to another unit, even as he said the officials he met in the office berated him for not coming going through the official channel for the transaction.

“We have been paying estimated bills since I packed into this compound two years ago. However, when I complained to the man who always came to share the bills to us, he said he can help me procure and install a prepaid metre, even if it meant my using it alone or sharing light to other others. You can imagine my happiness as I used few weeks to gather the N25,000 he told me that was the official price.

“However, months after paying him the money, I did not see the prepaid metre or any sign of installation. He kept telling me to be patient as he was working on getting it, that it was always difficult to get it from the office, among other issues he never mentioned to me before I gave the N25,000 to him. Later on, he stopped coming to my apartment,” he said.

Continuing, he said: “When I traced him to his office, I was told he had been transferred to another part of the town and that I was not the only one he collected money from to issue a prepaid metre, which I learnt was even free then. They even blamed me for not coming to meet them in the office to make inquiries, but choose to transact businesses outside the office.

“They said I should offset 50 per cent of the N500,000 debt that was being owed by my apartment even before I packed into the compound before they can consider listing me for metre installation. I am still angry with the AEDC officials for exploiting me. As it is, I am still paying estimated bills of up to N3,000 per month, whereas the money I paid for prepaid metre can’t be recovered.”

 Gimmicks of officials

According to a consumer in the Utako area of the FCT Mr Musa Bello AEDC officials are full of tricks. He said they would make sure that they maintain steady power supply after disconnecting many consumers for defaulting, so that they can rush to pay. Bello said after most of them are reconnected the company will return them to darkness.

“When they disconnect your light, the supply becomes steady, so that you will be forced to go and pay. However, after payment, the light becomes epileptic ones again, leading to disenchantment, which will persist until the next electricity bill or payment is due. Who wouldn’t be angry? What is the rationale behind such exploitation?

“We accuse government of corruption daily, yet we engage in acts of corruption at our own low levels. If we engage in the exploitation of the less privileged, what moral right do we have to accuse those in government or at the head of affairs of corruption? We really need reorientation as an organisation or people.”

 No meter, no billing

Perhaps, to drive home the point, on May 24 this year, electricity consumers in Delta state charged the NERC to enforce the “no meter, no billing” rule in the country.

According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), the consumers made the demand at a one-day NERC Electricity Consumers Public Consultation workshop in Asaba with the theme: Capping of estimated billing and distribution franchising.

Some of the consumers including: Mr john Uche, Mr Larry Olise, Mr Sam Obidi, Mrs Ngozi Obi, described the services of the Benin Electricity Distribution Company (BEDC) in the state as deplorable and reaping off the consumers through estimated billings.

According to them, the people of Delta deserve apology from the distribution company and the power regulator for the poor services and neglect.

“Nigerians are not supposed to pay for meters, nor procure transformers, electricity cables, among others, before being connected to the public power source. NERC should make the DisCos supply pre-paid meters free to every home and until they do this, they must stop giving the consumers estimated billings. We insist on no meter, no billings,” they said.

They, however, pledged to explore opportunities in the distribution franchise and called on NERC to fasten the process of meter supply and installation to every consumer; to ensure proper electricity billings in the state.

On his part, Mr Abu Ejoor, Executive Director, BEDC said that the company had complied and would ensure the metering of all electricity consumers in the state in line with the directive of NERC.

According to him, it is the duty of the DisCos to procure electricity materials and to connect consumers to the power source, adding that enumerations of consumers in the state was on going and that, when all the processes were concluded, consumers, who pay for the meters, would be metered.

NERC reacts

The NERC Chairman, Prof. James Momoh, while addressing the forum, assured them that modalities were being worked out to ensure that the DisCos stop forthwith the estimated billings.

He also said that the meters were not free, as consumers would have to pay for them. According to him, the reason for the consultation is to seek the consumer’s inputs on the issue of estimated billing.

He said: “Capping estimated billing here means that the former estimated billings charged consumers for not having meters is going to stop. This consultation is to get consumer’s opinions and options, and when the capping is agreed and the bill passed, there will be a maximum amount consumers should pay if the DisCos does not provide meters.

“The whole idea is to provoke, promote and make DisCos to provide pre-paid meters to Nigerians. All over the world, consumers pay for electricity through metering. We now have requirement that meters should be provided to all customers in Nigeria, but that may take more than one day and we said metering should start May 1 this year.

“This could take time, but we have a maximum period of two years to provide meters to all registered customers with the DisCos. But in doing that, we have to put a cap to maximum amount consumers will pay, so that you will not be over estimated.”

 AEDC intervenes

When this reporter visited the AEDC head office in Wuse Zone 4, Abuja, on Wednesday, September 18, the Corporate Communications manager, Mr Oyebode Fadipe, said that the DisCo was doing its best to metre every customer.

He provided statistics of the total number of customers that have either applied or paid for prepaid metres, even as he enumerated the achievements of the DisCo since the MAP project commenced in May this year.

He said: “We are the leading DisCo in the country. The data, as at Tuesday, September 17, showed that 50,711 customers have applied for prepaid meters. We have verified 48,378, while only 26,925 have paid. As at today, we have been able to install 22, 8553. As a matter of fact, if the current data is anything to go by, the current installation of more than 20,000 metres shows more than ninety per cent performance.

“Data reveals that the MAP project is customer-driven. It involves four important stages: application, verification, payment and installation. We have even taken the MAP to the next level. We have started mobile MAP metering by creating a one-stop shop, where customers can start and conclude the process the same day. Right now, we can install metres for customers within 24 hours.

“We have created several teams attending to customers, as we now go to them to prove that we mean business, instead of they coming to us in trickles. For instance, we have installed over 200 metres in UTC and over 300 metres in an estate in Kubwa. So, in a nutshell, our services are customer-driver, but we are efficient and exceed target expectations.”

Continuing, he added: “It will be unfortunate if we find situation of extortion. Customers should be brave enough to report any case of extortion. We have always dealt with pockets of unethical conducts. The MAP project is a third party affair, but we are the biggest name in it. Those who install metres are not AEDC staff, we only provide them with the network and customers.

“If customers report the installers to us, we will then report them to their employers for appropriate actions, because there is a service agreement with them. We can’t allow their conducts to erode our reputation as we owe our customers the responsibility to protect them and that’s what we are doing. We want to metre everybody within the 36 months of the MAP project, as estimated billing is not exact science and is often the leading cause of friction between electricity consumers and DisCos.

“As for those manhandling AEDC officials, it is wrong to take laws into your hands. The law courts are there for you to channel your grievances. NERC has also provided a forum for customers to express themselves if they don’t feel satisfied with services. In a nutshell, AEDC is poised to deliver efficient services to our customers in our cashment area.”

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